Brock Rumlow (Earth-11584)
History "I should torture you to find Barton's wife Stark, make her pay for the redecoration stunt she pulled on my face. Or maybe I'll just pay it forward by rearranging yours!" Brock Rumlow is a mercenary, former SHIELD and HYDRA agent. Born in New Jersey, Rumlow was a former Army Ranger who served with and possibly trained alongside fellow Army Rangers Clint Barton and Barbara Morse. While it is unknown if they interacted in their brief time in the military together, this was noted by Rumlow when he encountered Morse later on in life, and that he did not hold them and their "cavalier attitude" in high regard. Unlike Barton and Morse, who were court-martialed for disobeying a direct order, Rumlow was a "perfect" soldier, and would serve as one of the first frontline troops in the war in Afghanistan in 2001. By 2004 Rumlow had left the Army and found himself recruited by the criminal organization HYDRA. He was ordered to infiltrate SHIELD and act as a mole, one of several the organization had placed throughout the years. Rumlow went through the SHIELD training academy, graduating near the top of his class. By 2013 he was assigned to one of the elite Special Ops Teams in SHIELD, known as STRIKE, under the command of one Capt. Steve Rogers, aka Captain America. Unbeknownst to Cap, much of the STRIKE team consisted of HYDRA plants like Rumlow. The team accompanied Cap to the Lumerian Star on a mission to stop pirate Georges Batroc. The mission was a success and, with Rumlow acting on orders from others, Batroc was killed before he could be further interrogated by Captain America. Rumlow would later be tasked by Alexander Pierce (actually a Life Model Decoy posing as Pierce) to capture Captain America and hold him for questioning in the assassination of SHIELD director Nick Fury. Rumlow assembled the STRIKE team on an elevator to try and apprehend Rogers, only for Cap to escape and evade capture, eventually thanks to help from the Black Widow. Rumlow would track their movements, but was ordered not to intercept them as they traveled first to New Jersey and the back to Washington. He waited to ambush them with help from the Winter Soldier, eventually shooting and capturing Rogers, Romanoff, and Sam Wilson. He brought them to SHIELD agent/HYDRA mole Jasper Sitwell, who tried to turn them to his side. When that failed, Rumlow was ordered to kill the three. However a member of Rumlow's STRIKE team had been replaced by former SHIELD agent Barbara Morse, who fought against Rumlow and managed to defeat him, kicking back a fragmentation grenade in his face that caused severe burns across his face and upper chest area. Rumlow would survive the incident, though heavily scarred by it. Disgraced from HYDRA and on the run from SHIELD, Rumlow went underground. Through unknown means (likely procured from a black market dealer such as Melvin Potter) he acquired pneumatic gauntlets that augmented his physical strength. Calling himself Crossbones, he made a living as a mercenary for hire and quickly became one of SHIELD's most wanted fugitives. Eventually Rumlow entered the employ of the Mandarin and the terrorist group the Ten Rings. In a setup, Rumlow and his men attacked a marketplace in Shanghai, drawing out Tony Stark and the Avengers. Rumlow confronted Stark, lamenting the fact that Cap wasn't with him, and told him that he now worked for "a dead leader" of the Ten Rings. After setting up a controlled detonation, Rumlow vanished with the teleportation powers of the Mandarin. Rumlow then attacked again, crashing the first attempted wedding between Tony Stark and Virginia Potts. Despite attacking in overwhelming force, Stark was ready for the ambush and managed to capture Rumlow and fend off the mercenaries as a result. In an interrogation, Rumlow divulges some minor details about the mysterious Mandarin, before being shipped off to the Raft prison where he remains today. Powers & Abilities * SHIELD training: Like all SHIELD special agents, Rumlow received basic training in firearms and unarmed combat, though Rumlow's training was likely far more advanced since he led a Special Ops Team known as STRIKE in combination with Capt. Steve Rogers. * Pneumatic Gauntlets: Since the fall of HYDRA, Rumlow has operated as a freelance mercenary, and began using pneumatic gauntlets to augment his physical strength tenfold. The gauntlets use pressurized air to increase the power of his punches, and have been shown to be able to destroy solid brick walls with a single blow. Weaknesses The pneumatic gauntlets that Crossbones uses do not appear to be top of the line made compared to other advanced tech we have seen, as they are prone to breakdown at inopportune time. Despite their strength, as well, Iron Man has shown that he can take a full on punch from them and still survive relatively unscathed, so there effectiveness against high-end enemies is suspect. Film Details Rumlow appears in the following films in the Earth-11584 continuity. In all cases he is portrayed by actor Frank Grillo. * Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) * Iron Man 4 (2016) Category:Earth-11584 Category:Earth-11584 Characters Category:Bad Characters